Every vote counts in the General Election

Bradley Bytes – A Sort of Political Column with Dara Bradley 

Every vote counts. No, seriously. Every single vote cast in tomorrow’s General Election will determine who represents Galway West in Dáil Éireann.
Not convinced and think voting makes no difference? Well consider this – what would Galway have been like without Pádraig Conneely?
Like him or loathe him – there is no middle ground – his presence on Galway City Council had an impact, be it negative or positive, depending on your outlook, on public life in Galway for 15 years.
It might never have been. In the 2004 local election, Conneely, a Fine Gael candidate, had 746 votes after the third count when Independent Mike Geraghty was eliminated. Fianna Fáil’s Martin Quinn also had 746. After a couple of recounts, they remained tied.
The ‘equality of votes’ rule meant that sitting councillor Quinn was eliminated, and lost his seat. Conneely was subsequently elected on the sixth count because Quinn had nine fewer first preference votes in the first count than Conneely. The rest is history.
In 2011, after two recounts in Galway West, Seán Kyne (FG) was elected to the Dáil ahead of Catherine Connolly (Ind), with a margin of just 17 votes.
Sinn Fein’s Maireád Farrell lost her City Council seat in May. She was 17 votes behind Owen Hanley (Soc Dems) after the ninth count. The gap grew to 19 after a recount.
It was tighter in City Central where one vote buried the hopes of John McDonagh (Labour). After the ninth count McDonagh was eight votes behind Martina O’Connor (Greens). After a recount, McDonagh and O’Connor had 768 votes each, but like Conneely in 2004, she advanced because of a higher first preference vote and was subsequently elected. His transfers favoured Collette Connolly (Ind) over Sharon Nolan (Soc Dems).

Voting makes no difference, you say? Tell that to Quinn, Conneely, Connolly, O’Connor, Nolan and McDonagh.

For more Bradley Bytes about Saturday’s General Election see this week’s Galway City Tribune